Freewheeling
by domina tempore
Summary: Claudia finds "Aladdin's Magic Carpet" while she's alone in the warehouse... and then finds out why it's there. Set right after "Breakdown".


_Author's Note: I recently became addicted to this show; unfortunately, I don't have sci-fi channel, so I'm forced to watch it on Hulu, where there are only 5 of the last episodes for me to watch. But I'm loving it; and I love the characters. I especially love Claudia, and the messes that she gets herself into. So, here's a Claudia fic :). R&R, but please be nice; this is totally, totally new to me; and way out of my normal fandoms... and I made her just a little bit too spazzy, methinks :P lol... _

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**Freewheeling**

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Claudia crossed her arms and watched Myka start to leave, then change her mind and turn back.

"Are you sure that you're gonna be okay in here alone today---?" Claudia laughed.

"Myka, I'm fine! I've been working here alone before, you know."

"Yes, I know; but those same times, you also knocked silly string into the gears of the "gooery", that keep the containment goo flowing though this place and it almost blew up; and you turned yourself into a giant magnet and almost got crushed by a truck... and there are so many other things that happened just during those incidents that I don't even have to go through the rest of them---"

"Myka! I know that I've been... a little clumsy in the past, and maybe a bit..."

"Careless?"

"..._distracted_; but we always manage to fix everything, right? I mean, the warehouse is still standing; and I probably know it better than almost anyone else by now." Myka sighed.

"Alright, if you're _sure_..."

"Hey, you trust me, remember? And it's just a couple of hours out of one afternoon; you and Pete are going to get doughnuts. I'll be here and everything will be fine when you get back." Myka managed a couple of steps in the right direction, but she still didn't seem sure. Claudia laughed at her again.

"Go! Go on, get out of here; enjoy your freedom!" she shoved the older woman gently until she relented. Once she was far enough away that she wouldn't hear, Claudia grinned and put her hands on her hips, looking around with excitement.

"I'm sure that I'll find something to do around here to alleviate the boredom..."

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Claudia explored between the tall, junk-filled shelves of the warehouse, laughing at some of the odd artifacts that she came across and looking for something to keep her interest.

"Hm, let's see what we can find today..." she said, peering behind a couple of artifacts to see if there was anything interesting hidden behind them.

"Cinderella's glass slipper?" she read one of the glowing signs. "Hm... shoe conforms to the foot of the right wearer... Ha! So that's how she did it..." Then she looked closer at the fine print. "abandoned because once it conformed, it wouldn't come off." She lifted her hands off of the shelf and backed away. "Okay. Not trying on the glass slipper..."

She walked a little bit further, and realized that she must have come across the "Disney comes to life" section of the warehouse; because there was everything from the glass slipper and the fairy-godmother's wand (which was in storage because everything that it had magicked had eventually turned into a pumpkin), to Aladdin's magic carpet and lamp.

"Sweet!" She went to take a closer look at the carpet, making a mental note to come back and try the lamp later. It seemed okay; a little faded and shabby, maybe; but hey, the thing flew! It _deserved_ to show signs of its mileage. And it even looked fairly safe.

"Oh, this is perfect. Rest of the warehouse, here I come!"

She laid the carpet on the ground and sat on it, her legs crossed as she remembered seeing in the old cartoon that she had watched as a kid.

Nothing happened.

Frowning, Claudia wiggled around a bit, wondering if maybe she was sitting on the wrong part of the thing. But no matter where she squirmed, nothing happened.

"Ahh! Why won't you _work_?!" She threw herself forward, resting her hands on the edge of the carpet an balancing her head on top of her arms.

For a minute she just laid there, beyond frustrated; when she felt something different. Very, very slowly, she opened her eyes and peeked out ovr the edge of the carpet.

"Whoa," she breathed. She was _way_ high up; the carpet must have been rising the whole time. "This is so sick!" She laughed excitedly, and gripped the edges of the carpet, leaning forward just a little.

This time, the carpet obeyed her touch instantly; almost like it was kissing up to her.

"Ew, gross!" she grumbled, erasing the thought from her mind and guiding her new ride on a weaving course through the warehouse.

It was pretty sweet; she could get used to this. Let everyone else have their cars or trucks or motorcycles or whatever (not that she would have _denied _any of those things, had they been offered to her); how many people in the _world_ could say that they owned a magic carpet?! The thought made her grin get even bigger.

"This is awesome!"

She executed a crazy spin, holding on as tight as she could as she flipped completely upside-down. But the carpet seemed to have some sort of artificial gravity---she wondered how the heck _that_ had happened---because she stayed centered on the carpet, instead of hanging by her hands as it was upside down.

"Weeeee!" She shouted, as the carpet completed its flip and turned right-side up again. "Haha, this is so sweet. I'm totally taking this to school one day." She leaned gently, turning the carpet to the right and intending on making a one-eighty turn and heading back to the office to wave to Artie; he couldn't _possibly_ deny the coolness factor of this!

Everything was going smoothly, and the office was already in sight when she found that she couldn't slow down.

"Oh, come on! Ugh, why do the brakes decide to fail _now_?!" Well, maybe Artie wouldn't be "happy" with her; but maybe he would know how to fix it.

"I just hope I don't craaaash!' she said, as she hurtled faster and faster towards the office. "Artieeee! Heeeeelp!"

She was coming dangerously close to the window now. At the last second, she pulled a tight turn, and managed to change the carpet's course before she squashed into the window like a bug on a windshield. But she had seen a brief glimpse of the inside, and she remembered that Artie wasn't there. He was still at the B he'd promised to meet them at the warehouse later.

"Oh, crap, looks like I'm on my own with this one!" she whined, cringing. Artie was _so_ going to kill her for this one. "Okay, take deep breaths, Claudia; deep breaths. What would Artie do, what would Artie do?" She continued to chant those words to herself as she barreled out of control around the warehouse. But no matter how many times she said it, nothing came to mind.

"Now I can see why they abandoned this artifact---Yikes!" she had almost run into one of the lights. The carpet seemed to be losing altitude, now that she thought about it. "Hey, maybe that's a good thing." She felt the speed increase. "Okay, I take it back; this is bad, definitely bad!" she made a face and screwed her eyes closed, glad that she at least wouldn't have to see Artie's reaction to her mistake if she was squashed into a wall or a pole or something.

Behind her closed eyelids was an image of the warning screen that had detailed the carpet; the one that she had given no more than a glance. But suddenly, the small print at the bottom was very clear and obvious. _Problems with speed control. To stop, let go._Her eyes flew opened and glanced down at her hands---which were getting dangerously close to the tall shevles she had been flying over. They were clenched tightly around the edges of the carpet; so tightly that her knuckles were white.

"There is no way I'm letting go of this thing..." the carpet seemed to speed up even more. She yelped. "Okay, okay; here goes nothing." She closed her eyes tightly again, took about half a second to psych herself into it, and released it.

For a moment she wasn't sure if it had worked; but when she finally opened her eyes, she wasn't moving anymore. She relaxed from her tense position and looked around, a little confused what had happened until she realized that she had landed on the very top of one of the high shelves. For a second she was worried, but then she just shrugged.

"Well, I guess they could find me in a worse place than this..." she said in a small voice.

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Myka and Artie and Pete all walked in together, Myka and Artie each with one half a doughnut and Pete holding a bag of them.

"Hey, where is Claudia?" Artie asked, looking around. "Usually she's in here, making a mess... oh, gosh, where did you leave her?"

"Now Artie, Artie, I'm sure she's fine," Myka promised. "She promised me that she wouldn't let anything get out of hand while we were gone---"

"Yeah, knowing Claudia, she'd probably destroy the evidence before we got back," Pete said through a mouthful of doughnut. Myka hit him.

"Pete!"

"Hey, all I know is that she's good at that kind of thing..."

"Pete, Claudia is a smart,responsible girl."

"Yeah; but she's also reckless."

"Oh, and like you're not?" Pete opened his mouth to reply, but Artie raised his hands and shushed them.

"Shhhh, be quiet, be quiet, be _quiet_!" They obediently shut up as Artie looked around, a weird look on his face. "What was that sound?" For a moment they were all silent and still, listening; and then Pete and Myka heard it too. It was a slow, rhythmic _clunk, clunk, clunk_ that sounded an awful lot like footsteps. Frowning in confusion, they all went over to the windows and looked down.

Claudia was standing on top of one of the shelves, walking carefully across it. She looked up suddenly and saw them, and waved shakily.

"Oh, hi guys! Yeah, there was just a little problem with Aladdin's magic carpet, and when I tried to fix it, I ended up getting stuck up here; so if you guys could get a rope or some silly string or the cherry-picker or anything and help me get down, that would be _great_---hey, did you bring me any doughnuts?"

Fin.

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_A/N: Okay, so I don't exactly know how well I did with this; I was working with somewhat limited material. But I hope that you all at least though it was funny ;). Tell me if you want more of something like this; I'll look more into the show and see what I can do :). _


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